Arctic stronghold of worlds seeds flooded after permafrost melts

No seeds were lost but the capacities of the rock-and-roll tomb to provide failsafe be protected against all disasters is now are a threat to climate change

It was designed as an impregnable deep-freeze to protect the worlds most valuable seeds from any global catastrophe and ensure humanitys food supply forever. But the Global Seed Vault, buried in a mountain deep within the Arctic circle, has been breached after global warming created extraordinary temperatures over the winter, mailing meltwater gushing into the admission tunnel.

The vault is on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen and contains almost a million packets of seeds, each various categories of its significant food crop. When it was opened in 2008, the deep permafrost through which the tomb was sunk was expected to provide failsafe be protected against the challenge of natural or man-made disasters.

But soaring temperatures in the Arctic at the end of the worlds hottest ever recorded year led to melting and heavy rain, when lighting snow should have been falling. It was not in our plans to think that the permafrost has not been able to be there and that it would experience extreme climate like that, mentioned Hege Njaa Aschim, from the Norwegian government, which owns the vault.

A lot of sea went into the start of the passageway and then it froze to ice, so it was like a glacier when you started in, she told the Guardian. Fortunately, the meltwater did not reach the tomb itself, the ice has been hacked out, and the precious seeds persist safe for now at the requirements for storage temperature of -1 8C.

But the breach has questioned the capacities of the tomb to survive as a lifeline for humanity if catastrophe strikes. It was supposed to[ control] without the help of humans, but now we are watching the seed tomb 24 hours per day, Aschim mentioned. We must understand what we can do to minimise all the risks and make sure the seed bank can take care of itself.

The vault administrators are now taking precautions, including major work to waterproof the 100 m-long passageway into the mountain and digging trenches into the mountainside to channel meltwater and rain away. They have also removed electrical equipment from the passageway that produced some hot and installed pumps in the tomb itself in case of a future flood.

Aschim said there was no option but to find solutions to ensure the enduring safety of the tomb: We have to find solutions. It is a big responsibility and we take it very seriously. We are doing this for the world.

This is supposed to last-place for infinity, mentioned smund Asdal at the Nordic Genetic Resource Centre, which operates the seed vault.